From ‘Dreadful’ to Done: How Vine Management Tamed Budget Season With AI

No one dreads summertime like a community manager. While residents are socializing and sunbathing, many managers are drowning in spreadsheets, losing sleep over missing line items, and mentally preparing to fend off pitchforks while justifying due increases.

Jay McCray didn’t mince words describing what budget season once felt like at his company, Vine Management: “It was always dreadful.”

The budgeting process would hijack his team's time and productivity for months as they manually compiled a year's worth of invoices, utility bills, and contracts into custom Excel templates. The uncertain economic climate, with unpredictable inflation and costs that can shift dramatically year over year, added another layer of complexity. And when boards pushed back on proposed increases, managers had to scramble to connect the dots across dozens of communities and countless contracts.

Meanwhile, new business and client onboarding stalled.

"We would not even touch an association during the summer months, just because our heads are down,” Jay says. “Onboarding them would take forever on top of everything else."

The burden of budget season had become untenable, but Cephai, CINC’s AI-native platform, was growing more sophisticated. That year, Jay returned from CINC's annual user conference feeling energized. 

This was exactly the kind of grueling, “dreadful” work that Cephai was made to solve.

With Cephai

Budget Season: Less Gloom, More ‘Zoom’

These days, Jay and his team don't dread budget season. With the AI-powered Budget Skill in Cephai, what once took months of manual work now takes a fraction of the time.

"I know that we'll be able to zoom through that easily in a month with all of our associations, and have solid budgets to be able to present to our boards," says Jay.

Cephai analyzes historical data to surface trends, flag cost increases, and generate informed projections automatically. Instead of scrambling to build a case, managers walk into board meetings already equipped.

When Vine Stopped Doing Budgets the Hard Way

The Bottom Line

Vine has left the dread of budget season firmly in the rearview, and the impact has rippled across the entire business—from manager morale to board relationships and bottom-line growth.

And the company isn't slowing down. As CINC continues to expand Cephai’s skills, Jay is first in line to leverage new efficiencies.

His advice to management companies still doing it the hard way?

"If you're not utilizing it, your competitors are. Before you realize it, it's going to be way too late."